The upcoming exercise will be three times the size of last year's closely watched drills and perhaps bigger than the Soviet Union's largest training event.
Thousands of Polish and other NATO troops have launched major defensive exercises in Poland’s north amid security concerns raised by war games recently held by neighboring Russia and Belarus.
A Russian military helicopter gunship accidentally fired on spectators during war games in western Russia, a news website reported Tuesday, adding the two people were injured.
Russian President Vladimir Putin has attended the weeklong war games with Belarus that have demonstrated the Russian military’s resurgent might and made neighboring countries nervous.
A senior NATO official says there’s reason to be concerned about the large-scale Zapad 2017 military maneuvers being conducted now by Russia and Belarus, since they could be seen as “a serious preparation for big war.”
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